To love the language
With most of us dug in for the duration, there’s no better time to tuck into a CD box set of neglected treasures. Not that I needed an excuse, mind you.
Hans Hotter
19 pieces since 2007 — in 7 roles, at 7 companies, most often at Bayreuth Festival.
19
pieces
7
roles
7
companies
20
years
Role Amonasro
Role Gurnemanz
The hill is greener
Live recordings of Hans Knappertsbusch conducting Parsifal seem to proliferate like stairways in M.C. Escher prints.
Role King Marke
I saw three ships
“Never in my life having enjoyed the true happiness of love I shall erect a memorial to this loveliest of all dreams…”
Role Kurwenal
The music lovers
The curious things about accepted wisdom is that sometimes it’s correct.
Role Moses
Die Sterne des Himmels werden zur Erde fallen
Chris’s Cache highlights the erstwhile Chicago Symphony Orchestra @ Carnegie series with not one but two starry operas conducted by Georg Solti: Salome with Birgit Nilsson and a performance of Moses und Aron
Role Schigolch
No saints in two acts
The cast of Wiener Staatsoper’s first-ever performance of Lulu in 1968 reads like a Who’s Who of then-contemporary Austro-German opera: the 28-year-old Anja Silja, Martha Mödl, Waldemar Kmentt, Hans Hotter, Hilde Konetzni, Manfred Jungwirth, Heinz Zednik, and Karl Böhm presiding over a production by Otto Schenk.
Role Wotan
Festive days
There has been a conspicuous absence of chat on Parterre about this year’s Bayreuther Festspiele.
Out of the past
Myto’s transfer of Herbert von Karajan’s star-bedecked 1958 Die Walküre from La Scala gives collectors on a budget access to one of the legendary performances committed to tape.
A ‘Ring’ for the rest of us
I was once accused—by my own mother, mind you!—of having too many recordings of Verdi’s Aida. The blistering audacity of that recrimination did get me to thinking: How many recordings of Aida is too many? I mean, you’ve got the old classic you cut your teeth on. Then there’s he one where the tenor and […]
I’ll take the fall
The days are getting shorter, but you can keep the prattle going this fall’s Talk of the Town! You will, you can, you must join in the discussion about: Great mezzo soprano performances (October),
Gained in translation (November), Teleport me back to… (December).